xiii.
Smells Like Teen Spirit
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Blair Cameron was well aware that her sister was going to get involved in the gold hunt eventually.
She expected it to be a little later, maybe when they've secured the load and were just about to cash it (rumor has it the Royal Merchant sunk with gold bars tagged British; she read in an article once, titled "How To Bend The Law, Pockets Full, Second Edition", that she found in the library of her mother's house) but certainly not on the brink of acquiring it. All they had left was lowering themselves into the well under the Crain House and trying to extract the gold without losing any limbs in the axe murderer's anything-but-humble abode.
John B told Blair first. They were under the window to her father's study, and maybe he wouldn't heard them if he was home. Maybe he was. The Routledge boy licked his lips and found it fitting to ask Blair for permission to involve her sister, after which which she reminded him that Kiara Carrera would never ever agree to work with Sarah. He said that he was aware, but wanted to try anyway.
It would've been concerning to anyone else just how strong the hold Sarah had on John B was; Blair, however, understood. It was easy to fall into love, let it infect your blood like the sourest of diseases, but it was harder to make the distinction between true love and the soft, puppy tint of it all. Would you die for each other? Would you slit your wrists in two for one another? Or would you call this love whatever? Oftentimes, the strongest types of infatuation, adoration, usually comes fast and sprints down a slope of grass until it gets tangled in the bear-traps laid out to catch unwanted brain activity. Again . . . Blair knew all about it.
She could feel the weight of it when she made her way into the Château's porch, and sat on the old outdoor couch besides Sarah. John B propped himself up besides her and said "Kie's on her way, we'll do what we can to convince her, okay?" He shared a glance with Pope and JJ, who didn't seem all too convinced as to how they could fix the girls' relationship. But if Blair made it once, then maybe her sister could, too.
And they weren't wrong because, when Kiara caught sight of Sarah, she might as well have combusted into flames right in front of them. Her jaw fell and she kept pacing around, angry eyes on Blair and John B more than most (well, him more than her because he was the one to lie after all, but she thought Blair understood just how much she didn't want to work with Sarah).
"No effing way!" she yelled. "You brought her here? So what? She's in on this now?"
Blair offered her a meek smile and a wave. "Hi, Kia."
"Bee!" Sarah groaned.
The curly-haired girl glanced between the pair with a grimace and scoffed incredulously. "Oh my God."
"Look, all I care about is her cut comes out of your share," JJ came to the rescue of the girl he had been looking at for so long, trying to figure her out. Why wasn't she looking at him? Had John B said something? Has Sarah? He swallowed his worries, bit his tongue and sat back in his seat.
"You know, I don't remember taking a vote," Kiara was back to yelling and Sarah was glaring at her from where she sat right in front of her. "This is our thing. A Pogue thing."
Blair opened her mouth to speak, but didn't; she has milked the whole "I'm-not-a-Pogue" thing enough.
Pope was sitting on the other arm of JJ's chair, sharing an uneasy look with Blair before he spoke up. "I gotta say, I'm just a tad uncomfortable with all of this," he pursed his lips, offering his opinion on the debacle.
"Thank you!" Kiara exclaimed.
"When are you not?" John B countered.
"I dunno. I rode here on the back of JJ's bike. Pretty comfortable," Pope shrugged.
"It's true," JJ nodded. "Most relaxed I've ever seen him."
Pope snapped his fingers. "Oh! And I really like Blair's car," he added. "The leather seats are nice."
JJ couldn't help but smile. He knew.
"That's cute, guys," John B rolled his eyes.
"You know, we were all extremely comfortably until you brought her," Kiara clenched her jaw and stared down at Sarah as if she wanted her to feel her weight in uselessness.
"Stop talking about me like I'm not here!" she yelled, leaning back in her seat. Her eyes met with Blair, who quickly shrugged and let her know through the white of her eyes that there was no way in hell she'd get involved between the two of them. And maybe she was a tad dissatisfied because her sister wasn't speaking up, but she was forcing herself to understand.
"Then leave," Kiara snapped.
Sarah scoffed and stared at John B. "I told you," she said.
"Told him what, exactly?" the Carrera girl frowned. "That you're a liar?"
Sarah scoffed. "No, that you're a shit-talking bitch," she shut her up. Pope exclaimed and JJ held out his money real quick; Blair buried her head in her hands and shook her head at the childishness of the two girls. "When have I lied?" she asked. John B nudged Blair desperately, but she only shrugged.
"My money's on Kie," JJ commented.
"You get somebody close to you─"
Sarah leaned forward. "I didn't lie about shit─"
Blair was about to speak up, but John B beat her to yet. "Everybody shut up!" he yelled. And silence swallowed them all while as he requested. Leo sighed and gestured towards him, as if strengthening his point. "Kie, you are my best friend, right?" he asked and she raised her brows for an answer. "And Sarah, you're . . . you're my . . ."
John B chuckled and Sarah smiled softly. "Say it." It was barely a whisper, encouraging him to utter the words he had been thinking about for days on end.
"You're my girlfriend," he finished.
"Oh . . . that's new," Pope muttered under his breath and looked down at the floor. Blair sighed.
"She's your girlfriend now?" Kiara frowned profusely, staring between the pair. "What was all that talk about you were just using her for information? Get a map, cut her loose."
"You said you were using me?" Sarah repeated, hurt.
John B leaned his head into his hand and sighed. "No."
"Yeah, you did," Pope said just as JJ uncomfortable nodded and replied, "you said those things." Blair grimaced and looked at her sister, unsure of what to do or say to calm the situation.
"Look, love just walked in, okay?" John B defended, trying his best to salvage both his relationships.
Kiara rolled her eyes and retched, "oh, vomit."
"I didn't expect it," John B continued. "It just─it kind of happened. And I'm not gonna deny it. Right?" At his words, Sarah's eyes scrambled for Blair yet again, but this time was beginning for an answer or an explanation or anything that would help her out of the slump. Was he lying? Blair shrugged and her chest rose in irritation. Sarah grabbed her sister's hand.
"Oh! That's corny," Pope whispers to the pair as JJ retched.
"Look, cut the bullshit, John B," Kiara rolled her eyes. She went straight for it, maybe even more irritated by Sarah and Blair's telepathic conversation than of anything else. "If she's in, I'm out," she said.
"I'm not doing this," John B shook his head, trying to think of something else to say. "I can't!"
She put him in an impossible position . . . but maybe he deserved it. "You are gonna decide," Kiara spoke over him and made it very clear. "I'm very interested, actually. Me or her?" she frowned and titled her head to the side impatiently.
"Both."
JJ whistled as Pope ooh-ed. "Went for the Hail Mary," the blonde commented with wide eyes.
Blair finally decided to manifest her presence, looking up at John B, shaking her head. "I told you this wouldn't work." She closed her eyes for a second, tiredness seeping through her doll-like features.
"You're supposed to be on my side!" Sarah said.
Kiara shook her head when Blair only sighed. "There are no fucking sides," she countered, grumbling, and leaned back into her seat. "Can you both just stop acting like little kids for a second?" That was her whatever-moment, right there.
Kie didn't say anything, but wiped her nose and barged out of the space. The door slammed behind her, and Sarah smiled sarcastically at her boyfriend as she crossed her arms in front of her chest. "It'll be cool, right?" she pursed her lips and nodded as John B stared at her apologetically. "I'm gonna leave."
"Sarah, don't," John B tried.
"Gonna let y'all chat. Bee, let me know," she said, then disappeared inside the Château, no doubt planing on leaving from the other side.
JJ jumped to his feet and clasped his hands together. "I'd just like to say, you handled that beautifully," he commented.
"John, I told you to let me talk to them," Blair frowned and scoffed incredulously. She ran her hands through her hair, looking between where each girl left a trace of their signature perfume (vanilla bean, raspberry-citrus). And then hers devouring the others (strawberries, silky vanilla, spicy cinnamon). "I told you to let me handle this alone─" Pope stood up mid-talk and followed after Kiara "─I could've fucking convinced them. But, no! Mr. I-Know-Better had to go and do everything himself!"
"Blair, shut up! I thought this was gonna work, okay? Shut up!" John B exclaimed and jumped to his feet to push her away.
"Back off, man," JJ warned through gritted teeth as he slid between them, clenching his jaw. "Don't let this out on her, okay? You're the one who fucked up," he defended the girl, who raised her hands in surrender and walked inside the Château, going straight for the kitchen. "Hey . . . Blair!"
She scoffed, shaking her head. "I don't need you to defend me, Maybank," she hissed, coming to an abrupt stop and spinning around to face him. She halted so fast he would've crashed into her if it wasn't for the barrier of molten anger protecting her bubble.
He threw his arms out incredulously. "Excuse me for trying to fucking help you."
John B followed behind the blonde and jumped on the counter, burying his face in his hands. "What else was I supposed to do?" he asked.
Blair rolled her eyes and leaned against the counter, adjusting her top. "Fucking let me handle it."
Pope came in through the door seconds later, frustration obvious on his face. Blair knew he had a thing for Kie and she also knew that he would tell her what happened between them as soon as he could. "What'd she say?" John B asked and threw him a warm water bottle.
"That you're an idiot," he replied and caught it mid-air.
"It's a no-brainer. You're picking Kie," JJ said as he reached forward and pulled the fridge open for a beer. Pope nodded but Blair stared silent; she was biased in the debate.
John B took a sip and held his arm out. "Look, I can't make a decision," he shrugged.
"So what? We're just dead in the water because you're pussy-whipped?" JJ muttered and tossed the beer bottle cap into the sink. He was visibly judging the boy. "We can't do this without Kie and you know it."
All eyes were on Blair for a second. She sighed and huffed, the hair in front of her face blown to the top of her head. "You know I love my sister more than anything, but . . . it isn't fair to Kiara if she backs out now. We've got 400 million on the line," she said. "My sister just got involved."
"Look, I can't do it without Sarah," John B raised his brows as though he was staying the obvious. There was a pistachio and white plaid-cloth behind him; Blair wanted to focus on everything but the dilemma. "They both have to be on it," he added.
Blair shook her head. "That's a totally possible thing to achieve, not like they've been hating each other for years."
"Yeah. Good luck with that," Pope added.
John B shook his head, staring at Blair almost scandalously. "You've fixed your shit with Kie, why can't Sarah?" he stated. He was grasping at straws by that point and Blair definitely wasn't having it.
"I was never involved with them, John," Blair sighed. "I only hung out with Kie about four times when she and Sarah were friends. Us hating each other was just collateral damage, you can't compare Sarah's situation to mine."
He hopped off the counter and walked towards the doorframe that separated the small kitchen and just-as-small living room. "You know what? This is my fault, all right?" John B stated. "But it's our problem. I've got a plan," he raised his beer. "And you three little shitheads are gonna help me out."
Blair threw her hands up in surrender. "Correction," she pursed her lips, "two little shitheads. I have no desire you help you dumb-asses out. I'm gonna go and actually try and fix this shit."
"Blair!" JJ called; she ignored him, going outside.
There was anger in his stomach; it unfolded and ate at the walls of his belly until it was churning and flipping, and he wanted so desperately to puke his internal organs out on the dirty carpet. Why wouldn't she look at him? What did he do? He wanted to reach out and grab her hand but she was already gone by the time he regained basic, mobile body-functions. The Maybank boy would've followed her outside if it wasn't for John B tossing one of his arms over the his shoulders and dragging him towards the living room. So he spared one last glance at the screen door, shook his heavy head, then plopped down on the couch and buried it in his hands.
And maybe the only reason Blair was so angry was because she was feeling the exact same way. The past has a way of sneaking up on you, her father used to say with guilt-ridden eyes she always chose not to see. She understood now.
She took at seat at the end of the dock and grabbed a cigarette from the pack in her pocket. Her lighter, that day, was a soft pistachio covered in messy white hearts she drew herself with a paint-pen while she was high off her mind. The flame sparked; she brought the brim of the French cigarette, from a pack her brother left on her nightstand that morning, maybe an apology for yelling at her (he always got the best cigarettes on the island with all his miscellaneous contacts), to her lips and inhaled in content. Blair left traces of gloss, stains that everyone she knew wished she could wash off with bleach.
The girl next to her stared. She had her legs up to her chest, salty tears leaving a dry trail down her sunlit cheeks. "He lied to me," she said. Her ukulele was besides her, the polished dark wood grazing her thigh. Blair stretched her arm out and grabbed it, placing it besides her lap softly. "We're not supposed to lie to each other," Kiara added.
"Love makes people feel like they can do everything," Blair shrugged. She placed the lighter and the pack over the chipping, salt-smelling planks and took the cigarette between her pointer and her index. "He's in love, Kia. I can see it."
"You think?" the Carrera girl breathed. It was a question.
The blonde nodded, then sighed. "Yes."
Kiara sniffled and wiped her nose with the back of her hand. "I don't want him not to have someone, I just don't understand why it's her." Blair couldn't understand. How could she? All her life, she was the one people wanted to be; viewing things her friend's view was in no way something her mind could conform to. "She always gets everything I want. The friends, the life . . ." she trailed off and shook her head "the sister."
"Hey," Blair called and placed her hand over Kiara's, "you've got me," she smiled. "And I don't know what it feels like to come second, as egoistic as that sounds, but I do know what it feels like to be on the outside looking in. Trust me," she scoffed. "It's like I'm watching myself slip away and I can't do anything about it. But this isn't the case for you."
She tried her best not to cry, sniffled again. "But it does feel like I'm slipping," Kiara whispered.
"You're not," Blair reassured her. "I won't let you."
Their eyes met and the brunette couldn't help but wonder why she spent so much of her childhood hating the Cameron girl. Because her mother always told her that she should be more like Blair Cameron. Because the first girl she fell in love with was in love with Blair Cameron. Because she lost her spot in the school musical to fucking Blair Cameron.
Now, there wasn't anyone in the long list of people she knew that could've calmed her down the way she did. "I don't wanna work with your sister." It didn't change her mind nonetheless, but she wasn't crying anymore.
Blair nodded and pushed herself to her feet, shoving the lighter and pack in her pocket. She balanced the cigarette in-between her lip and exhaled light smoke through her mouth, a hand on Kiara's shoulder. "Just think about it, yeah?" she proposed. She wasn't waiting for a nod from the girl now cross-legged on the dock; good thing because Kiara never did answer.
She pushed herself off the dock and walked away, and Blair tumbled her way down and away from the water. The dock creaked underneath her and the sun was so low in the sky it might as well have been melting into the shoreline. She ran her hands through her hair, perfect curls of blonde that she swore smelled like plastic sometimes, and tried to steady her breathing, the cold in the pit of her stomach turning into an unfathomable fire that gnawed at her insides and burned her organes at the edges. Crying would've been ideal, but she swallowed the rock in her throat harshly instead and pushed the door to the Château open with a sniffle.
Blair didn't even know why she was sad, she could just feel the lump in her throat and hated how heavy it was against her vocal chords. If it wouldn't cause a scene, she'd fucking scream.
The boys were sat around the living room table. JJ was leaning back against the couche and there was a small smile on his face that was wiped to oblivion as soon as she came in torn-edged picture. She sat down on the couch and her lips tugged into a small frown of discomfort, probably loose springs right underneath her. Whatever. She tried to cough away the lump in her throat, then sighed when it didn't work.
JJ groaned. Pope and John B shared a look. Blair shut her eyes and swallowed harshly.
"She said she'll think about it," Blair breathed.
She didn't open her eyes when someone took the cigarette from her lips and extinguished it into the ashtray in the center of the shaky table. "Hey . . . are you okay?" JJ.
"Just tired," Blair mumbled. She opened her eyes and, when they met his, she smiled softly. And then a contagious grin spread on his face, so much his dimples showed and his eyes crinkled because he really didn't have a smile from Blair Cameron directed at him in a long time and he was starting to think she was starting to hate him again. "What?"
"You know what you need? You know what you need?" he repeated, snapping his fingers and jumping off the couch, walking backward towards the door. "I've got a bag of pre-rolled Bs in the Twinkie. That'll cheer you up!" he exclaimed.
That soft smile didn't waver from her face, but she nodded and a scoff found its way out of her throat. That was the knot, she guessed, it was gone now. "Aw," John B smirked, emphasizing his words and bringing his hands up to his heart as Pope chuckled. Then he gaged and the Heyward boy hit him on the shoulder. "You guys make me sick. That smile was all sappy and shit."
"Oh, I'm sorry," Blair frowned in an amused haze, "did you say something, Mr. Love-Just-Walked-In?"
John B's mouth fell, exhaling breathlessly as Pope ooh-ed loudly, slapping the arm of his seat. "Is that how you're gonna play it? Is that how you're gonna play it?" he scoffed, repeating as he raised his brows and slowly lurched forward to grab a yellowish pillow from the couch she sat on. Then hit her violently with it.
"Holy shit!" Pope cursed, his jaw falling to the ground as he jumped out of his seat in surprise.
The whole world stopped for a second and John B's eyes widened slightly as he realized what he did. This was Blair Cameron he just hit with a fucking pillow. He wondered if she'd grab her stuff and leave, even if it was for a second, because they had yet to hang out with her just to do so and they were absolutely clueless.
But then Blair grabbed the pillow and violently tossed it back at him, yelling "bitch, it's on!"
A shit-eating grin was postered only his face. "Hell yeah!"
"Pick your side, Pope!" Blair threw herself behind the couch. She caught sight of something thrown carelessly on the ground and grabbed it with bright eyes, hiding it under the sofa-bed's back with a smug smirk. It had been years since she held a nerf-gun. Her hair was all over her face, messed up by the gritty pillow. In another life, she'd have broken a nose. "Kay, you've got right about three seconds. Three, two . . ."
John B grabbed a beer-bat (basically, like, twelve beers taped together until they formed a type of sword structure) and pointed it at Pope threateningly. "Don't you dare."
He paused, holding his hands out as the mediator. "No offense," he said, "but I'd rather die than pick a side."
"Huh," Blair jaw fell as she pressed her chin against the cushions and stared at John B. "Temporary peace to form an alliance against a common enemy?" she proposed
"Deal," he grinned.
"No─no, that's not fair! Wait!" Pope scram at the top of his lungs right before a nerf hit him right in the forehead. Blair whooped like a little kid when he groaned and threw himself past her and towards the door. JJ opened the door just as he got to it, and Pope's eyes widened as he jumped behind him. "JJ! JJ, they've got me cornered, dude. It's two against one!"
JJ frowned and spun around trying to catch Pope's eye, but the boy refused to stop moving as John B and Blair stood side by side and raised their weapons. "Wait, what? Nah, no, what the─" he was nerfed and hit in the head with the beer-stick at the exact same time.
"Hey, Jay," Blair grinned and held the gun up, hair still a mess, or maybe it was a halo.
The Maybank boy grinned at the nickname that threw him all the way back to months ago, when she'd press her lips against his bare shoulder and fall asleep. "Hey, Sugar," he smiled.
And then she had vanilla-strawberry gummies in her mouth and the sight coating her lips, though she hadn't eaten candy in a while. It smelled like sweets, sick, and she forgot all about the pack of cigarettes in her back pocket as she glanced between the Pogues; and she could see the valley's exit.
He tossed the bag of blunts on the cough and threw himself over it, rolling on the ground and grabbing the baseball bat under the sofa-bed whereas Pope slid in the kitchen, grabbed a slightly-burnt wooden spoon from the top drawer, then pushed it shut with his hip. Blair whistled and hit the plastic gun against her palm as John B dragged the stick behind him like the opening scene to a badly-directed horror movie.
As if it was a metal ninja-star, JJ grabbed a card off the top of the deck spread on the ground and tossed it at Blair, who easily skipped it. Amused, she exploded in bubbly laughed, then started blindly shooting at him and Pope until they were yelling and scrambling away from the pair and out the house.
These were moments of bliss; mere minutes of simply being teenagers under the hefty sun. It was scorching and reflected like glitter, skin polished with citrus surf-wax. She was just a girl in those moments, a girl who scratched at the lotto cards a little too hard and always did her shoelaces in double-knots around her ankles because she ran so much she was just afraid they'd fall apart and give her a bite of concrete for dinner.
Under that sky of yellow, the teenagers were brought back to life from the darkest of navies. Stuck in a game of cat and mouse between what they had and what they wanted and, suddenly, rewriting their history on paper wasn't enough because they wanted it to conform to real life, too. They poured sand on the creaky wooden planks as they ran down the dock and towards the water, seaside like blotches of gold, but maybe that was only because it smelled like it in the air. It was all yellow.
Pope hit Blair in the back with his wooden spoon and she yanked it from his hands in response and threw it in the water. Then, JJ spun the bat around and pretended that he was going to hit her and John B slipped off the side and fell straight in the water while trying to jump in front of her and take it himself. The rest whooped, and Pope jumped right after him. There was only Blair and JJ left on the dock, and both places their weapons on the ground and grabbed each other's hands before running off with loud laughs, just like little kids. And they hit the water and resurfaced all at the same time.
The teenage gods were gold-hungry and the canary-yellow sky was dropping into dark blue as they had the time of their life in the cold water of the OBX marsh. They aren't always in the sky, gods, some of them live on Earth and make it their bitch.